His own to the Deity, but there readily resulted a combination with the idea of sacrifice, whereby the latter was itself modified in a peculiar manner.  The atoning efficacy of the gift began to be ascribed mainly to the blood and to the vicarious value of the life taken away.  The outpouring and sprinkling of blood was in all sacrifices a rite of conspicuous importance, and even the act of slaughtering in the case of some, and these the most valued, a holy act.

II.II.2.  The features presented by the various literary sources harmonise with the foregoing sketch.  But the Priestly Code exhibits some peculiarities by which it is distinguished from the pre-exilian remains in matters sacrificial.

In the first place, it is characterised in the case of bloodless offerings by a certain refinement of the material.  Thus in the meal-offerings it will have SLT (simila) not QMX (far).  In the whole pre-exilian literature the former is mentioned only three times altogether, but never in connection with sacrifice, where, on the contrary, the ordinary meal is used (Judges vi. 19; 1Samuel i. 24).  That this is no mere accident appears on the one hand from the fact that in the later literature, from Ezekiel onwards, QMX as sacrificial meal entirely disappears, and SLT invariably take its place; on the other hand, from this that the LXX (or the Hebrew text from which that version was taken) is offended by the illegality of the material in 1Samuel i. 24, and alters the reading so as to bring it to conformity with the Law. 1

*************************************** 1.  Ezekiel xvi. 13, 19, xlvi. 14; I Chronicles ix. 29, xxiii. 22; Ecclus. xxxv.2, xxxviii. 11, xxxix. 32; Isaiah i. 13 (LXX); lxvi. 3 (LXX).  In the Priestly Code slt occurs more than forty times. **************************************

So also a striking preference is shown for incense.  With every meal-offering incense is offered upon the altar; in the inner sanctuary a special mixture of spices is employed, the accurately given recipe for which is not to be followed for private purposes.  The offering of incense is the privilege of the higher priesthood; in the ritual of the great Day of Atonement, the sole one in which Aaron must discharge the duties in person, it occupies a conspicuous place.  It has an altogether dangerous sanctity; Aaron’s own sons died for not having made use of the proper fire.  It is the cause of death and destruction to the Levites of Korah’s company who are not entitled to use it, while immediately afterwards, in the hands of the legitimate high priest, it becomes the means of appeasing the anger of Jehovah, and of staying the plague.  Now of this offering, thus invested with such a halo of sanctity, the older literature of the Jewish Canon, down to Jeremiah and Zephaniah, knows absolutely nothing.  The verb Q++R there used invariably and exclusively of the BURNING of fat or meal, and thereby making to God a sweet-smelling savour; it is never used to denote the OFFERING OF INCENSE, and the substantive Q+RT as a sacrificial term has the quite general signification of that which is burnt on the altar. 2